John

Good idea. Remember to use a high magnification for the star test - 200x or more ideally and make sure that the scope is fully cooled.

50x will show Jupiters disk, it's main cloud belts and the 4 Galilean moons. Actually even 10x shows that it's not a star and that it has moons.

It's a very new scope - just on the market. It will be popular in due course but there might not be many out there yet. @Chaz2bThe red dot finder in your picture is the Baader Sky Surfer III - it's pretty good I found when I had one

What ever you can adjust, adjust in very small steps. You might have to experiment a bit - looking through the cheshire, make a slight adjustment to one screw and note which direction the dot moves in. If it's the wrong way, adjust back then try another screw. As long as you only make small adjustments, it's easy to undo as needed.

I've done the same Gerry. Some insulation tape on the front end of one side of the finder foot or shoe often does the trick. I'm just trying to work out what would have the same effect on this design

So what is different in the way that the 2 finders are mounted / adjusted ?. Maybe @Dannomiss does have a faulty unit ? I know that @Lockie had some issues with the finder on the one that he was loaned for review and I think @JeremyS might have had similar. Trouble for me is that I'm shooting "blind" on this, not having an example of the scope to hand to play with.

Thanks - those are really helpful. The finder is installed perfectly as far as I can see. You have the adjustment in azimuth (left and right) right over to one side presumably to try and get the dot to match your scope eyepiece view. So somehow we need to skew the finder mounting in that direction a bit more to allow the adjustment to put the dot where it needs to be. Hope that makes sense - just got to think of how to do it neatly !

It's really not far off. If you can get the black dot of the cheshire in the centre of the "donut" on the primary, I'd be happy with that.

Clear night forecast again. A chance to try experimenting perhaps ?

Could you post a photo of the finder mounted on the scope next to the focuser ? Maybe from a few angles and when the finder is as closely aligned with the main scope as possible ? It will help work out what will hopefully be a simple fix to the problem. Currently I can only find one photo of your scope and the finder is not well shown in that. Sorry if you have already posted these somewhere else and I can't find them.

Probably not. It was just a guess. Maybe I picked the wrong term. The tube design has changed though to accommodate the larger optics so I was simply wondering if the design and positioning of the finder mount might need to be adjusted slightly to take account of that. The RDF itself has a reasonable degree of adjustment in azimuth and altitude so for it not to be possible to get it aligned with the main scope, the mounting rail on the scope must be some way off of alignment. @jetstream If there is simple a mod to sort it out then, yep I can overlook it, provided that the optics are decent. If the solution is that the owner needs to invest in a replacement finder at, lets say, £30 cost then that's a scoop out of the astro budget that might hurt if you are on a tight budget. Mind you, the Celestron Astromasters have been supplied with truly awful finders for quite a few years and Celestron / Synta have not done anything about those

I can understand that. I find that I need to have the finders on my scopes very precisely aligned with the main scope views to aid the finding process. Aligning along the scope tube is very hit and miss ! Mostly miss ......

Although a small part of the scope, it is a pretty important one. If it is a design problem I'd like to think that Skywatcher would put it right.

I'm bortle 5/4. So that makes a difference to the finding arrangements, I can see that.

I guess it is possible that the moulded finder bracket (which is an integral part of the upper tube assembly I believe) is not aligned properly - ie: a design issue ? Here is another guess - they used a similar pattern to the 130 but did not make an adjustment to allow for the parallax effect that the larger diameter optics and tube would create ? Just a guess though ....

You went for a 60mm RACI I seem to recall ? I actually find a 30mm RACI easier to use than a 50mm as the sole finder on a scope because it shows 6 degrees of sky and does not swamp the field with stars. On the scopes I have a 50mm RACI I usually have an RDF or similar as well just to get straight to the right area of the sky quickly and easily.

I had a RA but not CI once by accident (mis-described by the seller). I didn't get on with it although it actually worked OK. I find RACI works for me. I guess I like the finder view to look like the star charts I use and also the illuminated reticule finder, if I am using one alongside the optical one. I seem to be able to make the switch to "scope view" when I look through the eyepiece. It's all about personal preferences I guess

Well it does not seem to work like that in practice

The background sky would not be as dark with the longer focal length eyepiece. I have some light pollution here and that really makes a difference. I do have a 40mm eyepiece with a 70 degree AFoV (max field stop for the 2 inch barrel) so I can see the above very clearly when I compare the views of the Veil Nebula with the 31mm Nagler, the 40mm SWA and indeed the 21mm Ethos which shows a little less sky but darkens the background sky even more. Also certain exit pupils are more effective when using O-III and UHC filters. I think I would need to move to the 3 inch format to get an AFoV that is large enough to show 3.8 degrees with the F/9.

These are quite safe and work well: https://www.firstlightoptics.com/solar-filters/astrozap-baader-solar-filter.html

That point worked for me as well. I sent them some photos of my daughters room with the light coming through the window even with the curtains closed. A shield was fitted to the offending light within a week.

I'll just give one example. I have two 4 inch refractors - a Vixen ED102 with a focal ratio of F/6.5 and a Tak FC100-DL with a focal ratio of F/9. With my Nagler 31mm eyepiece the Vixen will show a true field of view of 3.8 degrees. With the F/9 the true field with the same eyepiece is a degree smaller. When I want to see the whole of the Veil Nebula in a single field of view, the F/6.5 will do that comfortably but the F/9 won't get near it.

The 130 made the split of Beta 648 that much easier although I didn't think the seeing last night was quite as good. I used 300x - 375x but the secondary was visible from 200x upwards. I got suggestions of a split on Antares but that one is so low down that it throws up a whole lot of it's own seeing issues ! I didn't stay out too late last night so no planets. Best of the session was Lambda Cygni which I think is a touch under an arc second currently. Last night at 375x it was a tiny "snowman" with a thin belt of blackness around his "waist" that flickered in and out of view as the seeing varied. Pairs such as Delta Cygni are a piece of cake with this scope

I don't find counterweights are needed with my 100mm - 120mm refractors. Above that (about 8kg) and they do help smooth the motions. The Giro Ercole (for example) needs counterbalancing a lot more than the Skytee II does.

Planets are never going to "fill the field" with a scope no matter what magnifications are used. I produced this Powerpoint presentation a while back for my astro society which attempted to show what things actually look like through a scope: telescopeviews.pptx What you actually see with a scope will vary of course and the darkness of the skies will make a difference on the deep sky object, but it gives some idea I hope.